92 
p^R.K AND ce;me;te;r.y 
control and patrol of the police. The wider roads 
should be planted with trees, either near the houses or 
in a double row in the center of the carriage way, 
affording shelter in rain and shade in summer. All 
the public elementary schools should have good play- 
grounds attached, open to all comers out of school 
hours ; and there should also be playing fields or open 
air gymnasia provided for children, with instruction 
in the use of gymnastic apparatus, and with a part 
devoted to trees and shrubs, flowers and seats. No 
large division or ward of the city should be without 
its park, capable of being illuminated by night, where 
broad expanse of grass might he seen, and where 
stretches of water in lakes or streams might bring 
refreshment to the eye. The public seats should be 
in groups, in well lighted parts of thoroughfares ; the 
drinking fountains and troughs should be artistically 
designed ; outdoor annexes to the restaurants should 
be encouraged ; and every effort should be made to 
preserve the natural beauties of any space or garden 
which may l^e secured for the people. Such is an 
ideal before the mind of the Metropolitan Public Gar- 
dens Association, and towards the fulfilment of 
which much has iDeen done. The public want educat- 
ing to the idea of preserving what is beautiful and of 
cultivating what is wholesome, and need to understand 
that the value of building land rises in proportion to 
the amount of timbered open space adjoining it, and 
that the more recreation grounds there are in a town 
the quieter and less crowded each one will be. 
M’hat may be termed the modern open space move- 
ment started before the close of the first half of the 
nineteenth century. The late Sir Edwin Chadwick, 
that great pioneer of sanitary reform, made a report 
in 1862 on the “Effect of Public Walks and Gardens 
on the Health and Morals of the Lower Classes,” and 
he then used the phrase “open spaces.” He also advo- 
cated the preservation as public land of the burial 
grounds in towns when they should be disused. It 
was greatly due to his careful investigations and re- 
f*orts that most of these graveyards were closed in 
1853 and the succeeding years, although another 
twenty-two years elapsed before any of them were 
converted into public gardens. Now, in London alone, 
there are over one hundred open to the public, nearly 
all being attractively laid out. Some of the square 
gardens have also been thrown open, notably those 
belonging to the Duke of Westminster, owing to the 
wisdom and generosity of the late duke), and those 
on the estate of the Marquis of Northampton — and 
they now number in London twenty-eight. 
T need hardly dwell on the very great success that 
has attended the work of the Commons Preservation 
Society, the Open Spaces Branch of the Kyrle Society, 
and the Metropolitan Public Gardens Association. 
These agencies have, by their labor and example, 
stirred such public authorities as H. M. Office of 
Works, the London City Council, the City Corpora- 
tion, the Metropolitan Vestries (recently succeeded by 
the Borough Councils), and the provincial County 
Councils and the municipal bodies, so that it is pos- 
sible to say that the desire to acquire open spaces or 
recreation grounds is universal, especially in the towns 
and their suburbs. Eull powers are now given to 
these public bodies, and to trustees or owners of pri- 
vate estates, to give, to acquire, to lay out or to main- 
tain open spaces : and information on all points con- 
nected with this subject is constantly supplied by the 
Secretary of the Metropolitan Public Gardens Asso- 
ciation, which, during the past eighteen years, has 
carried through upwards of four hundred and thirty 
successful undertakings within the area of the metro- 
politan district. Organizations such as this are much 
needed in other parts of the kingdom, and, by watch- 
ing for opportunities of securing spaces, by making 
preliminary negotiations with owners, by keeping the 
public l)odies alive to their powers and their duties 
and supplying valuable information, they can be of 
the greatest assistance to the municipal authorities, 
and to the people whom they represent. 
The following quotation from the Chairman's intro- 
duction to the Eighteenth Annual Report will, per- 
haps, show the lines on which the Association has 
worked. And here let me state that the Chairman is 
the Earl of Meath, who not only founded the society 
in 1882, but has allowed it ever since to use one of the 
rooms in his London house as its office, and has always 
taken a deep personal interest in its work. 
The Vice-Chairmen number amongst them several 
most eminent men, and they are not only ornamental 
but pre-eminently useful. The Landscape Gardener 
is Miss E. Wilkinson, whose experience of the treat- 
ment alike of sooty little spaces in the city or larger 
grounds outside, is quite unique. I have had the priv- 
ilege of being Honorary Secretary for sixteen years, 
while Mr. Basil Holmes has been the Secretary for 
thirteen years. 
“It is easy to say that between four and five hun- 
dred pieces of work have been successfully carried 
out, but very difficult to give any adequate idea of 
their varied nature, of the amount of labor they have 
involved, or of the unexpected and far-reaching in- 
fluence which they have exercised. The original ob- 
jects have always been kept in view; every suitable 
opportunity for adding to the open spaces of London, 
for preserving and improving existing recreation 
grounds, for planting trees and placing seats in public 
sites, for assisting the teaching of gymnastics in play 
grounds and halls, and for amending the laws relating 
to open space questions, has been siezed.” 
It is due to the Association that an act was passed 
in 1886 prohibiting building operations on land that 
had been set aside for interments. Thus the value of 
the numerous disused burial grounds in London was 
